Latest news with #northeasternOntario
CBC
2 hours ago
- Health
- CBC
Homelessness and addiction hubs in Sault Ste. Marie and Sudbury face delays opening
Social Sharing Treatment (HART) hubs in northeastern Ontario are still waiting for final approvals from the province to start operating. On the eve of the provincial election, Ontario Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced 19 new HART hubs would be operational by April 1. The hubs would provide access to recovery and treatment systems for people struggling with addictions and mental health issues, but would not provide any safe drug consumption services. Lisa Case is the CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) Algoma, which was chosen to run the HART hub in Sault Ste. Marie. She said the organization has submitted its budget with the province for the planned hub. Ontario's Ministry of Health and Ontario Health have reviewed that submission, Case said, but now she's waiting for additional feedback. "We have received updated terms and conditions related to that funding that we're reviewing with our partners and responding with some additional questions, but we're still in that holding pattern right now," Case said. She said the province has allocated CMHA Algoma a budget of $6.31 million annually over three years to run its HART hub. Case added the services are especially needed in northern Ontario. "We've been hit harder across the north in spite of the creativity that we've used as community partners and the interventions we're able to provide," she said. "We're seeing just the volumes of individuals seeking help and then often the distance to get help." The City of Greater Sudbury will run a HART Hub in collaboration with the Health Sciences North hospital. The city says it's still finalizing logistical details but should have more concrete information to share by next week. Ema Popovic, a spokesperson for Ontario's health minister, said in an email to CBC News that nine HART hubs in the province that were previously supervised drug consumption sites opened on April 1. That includes the NorWest Community Health Centre in Thunder Bay.
CTV News
2 days ago
- Health
- CTV News
Outbreak of forest tent caterpillars should last about 6 weeks
Experts say that in northeastern Ontario, the outbreak of forest tent caterpillars this year should last about six weeks. They're creepy, they're crawly and they seem to be everywhere. Forest tent caterpillars are cropping up in large numbers across northeastern Ontario. Experts say we're in an outbreak. 'It's not as severe as it has been in the past,' said Dan Rowlinson, the provincial forest health field coordinator with the Ministry of Natural Resources. Caterpillar1 They're creepy, they're crawly and they seem to be everywhere. Forest tent caterpillars are cropping up in large numbers across northeastern Ontario. (File) 'They're just in the tiny larval stage right now. So, they're just starting to feed on the aspen and the poplar trees. But they'll proceed through the summer and then we'll see more defoliation. I don't think it's going to be as significant as it was last year.' MNR monitoring shows eastern tent caterpillars are a problem, but Rowlinson said they're not as widespread as the forest tent species, also known as armyworms. Those are the ones experiencing the population boom. 'We're looking at about six weeks,' said Alexandra Binns, Science North's animal care technician, who said the area is on the upswing of a 10-year cycle. The last big outbreak was in 2018. 'Mice, rodents, but also birds and migratory birds, it's a quick and easy meal for them. And so as much as we might hate them, they are important to the environment.' — David Dutkiewicz, Invasive Species Centre 'Generally, once the young caterpillars emerge in early springtime, they can only really eat soft or freshly grown leaves,' Binns said. 'Because they can only eat those things, they eat them for about six weeks. That's the fresh start of spring. And then they'll start to cocoon and pupate from there.' Later in the summer, these pests will transform into moths. Caterpillar2 They're creepy, they're crawly and they seem to be everywhere. Forest tent caterpillars are cropping up in large numbers across northeastern Ontario. (Photo from video) Despite their annoyance, experts agree that forest tent caterpillars are important to the ecological landscape. 'They are more nutrients for birds and things like that,' said David Dutkiewicz, an entomology technician with the Invasive Species Centre. 'Mice, rodents, but also birds and migratory birds, it's a quick and easy meal for them. And so as much as we might hate them, they are important to the environment.' Dutkiewicz said picking the forest tent caterpillars off trees and other greenery or wrapping tinfoil around the base of the tree. He said spraying them with soapy water will also work, but doing it too often could harm the tree's protective wax coating. In case children pick one up or they fall from trees onto unsuspecting folks below, it's important to remember the caterpillars aren't harmful to humans, unless there is an allergy to the critters' hairs. Mostly, they're just annoying and gross.
CTV News
6 days ago
- Business
- CTV News
Study paints grim picture of worsening wait times in northern Ont. ERs
The median patient spent about five and half hours at the ER before they were discharged from HSN. A new study by the Canadian think tank MEI says new approaches are needed to deal with growing wait times at hospital emergency departments across Canada. In particular, it suggests adopting a model used in France, where separate clinics are set up to deal with emergency cases that are not life and death, such as bone fractures, sprains and serious flu cases. The study looked at the median times it takes patients to be assessed by a physician, as well as how long people spend in the ER, from the time they arrive until they are discharged. Timmins hospital to benefit from new lottery Included was data from hospitals in northeastern Ontario, where Health Sciences North in Greater Sudbury reported the longest waits. The median patient spent about 5 ½ hours at the ER before they were discharged from HSN. Results from other major hospitals in the northeast include three hours, 45 minutes at Timmins & District Hospital; four hours, 40 minutes at Sault Area Hospital; and, four hours, 56 minutes at North Bay Regional Health Centre. The study also looked at the length of time it took to get an initial assessment from a doctor in the ER. Timmins again had the shortest time – one hour, 43 minutes – followed by the Sault (one hour, 56 minutes), North Bay (two hours, 16 minutes) and Sudbury (two hours, 23 minutes). Results for all hospitals in northern Ontario – and Canada – can be found here. Krystle Wittevrongel, MEI's director of research, said in an interview that Canada's system of funneling all emergency cases to the same community emergency departments is partly to blame for the ER bottlenecks plaguing the system. Krystle Wittevrongel Krystle Wittevrongel, MEI's director of research, said Canada's system of funneling all emergency cases to the same community emergency departments is partly to blame for the ER bottlenecks plaguing the system. (Photo from video) While we do a good job of addressing critical cases as they come in, people with non-life-threatening but emergency cases are often left to wait several hours for care. One option would be to adopt a model used in France where separate, middle-emergency clinics are set up to handle serious but not life-threatening cases. The clinics are a midway point between walk-in clinics that can't handle emergency cases and the overwhelmed emergency departments at hospitals. 'We tend to see a lot of patients going to the emergency room for care that might not need to be there,' Wittevrongel said. 'They might have a more minor injury like a sprain or a strain that isn't necessarily emergency care but is a little bit much for primary care (physicians).' Middle emergency clinics She said France has had great success with this model, which is a better allocation of existing resources. Similar to walk-in clinics, the middle care centres would be publicly funded but independently run by doctors and nurses. 'Rather than being the same as an urgent care centre like the Province of Ontario currently has, it's more community-focused and so there's also more localized decision-making, (offering) more flexibility for those doctors and nurses.' She said the median length of stay in northeastern Ont. ERs is four hours, 14 minutes, which shows the differences in factors such as the number of hospital beds and staffing levels. By creating a system of middle-emergency care centres, hospitals in the north could potentially ease the demand on existing staff, making it easier to retain people. Read more on MEI's study here.
CBC
14-05-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Sault Ste. Marie just the latest northern Ontario municipality to consider the OPP in order to save money
Social Sharing Many towns and cities across northeastern Ontario have their eye on Sault Ste. Marie, as that city considers a switch to provincial police. Sault city council asked this week for a report detailing how much it might save if it disbanded its city police force and hired the OPP. Several small towns across the region have made that move over the years. Wawa swapped its local police for the OPP in 2011, hoping to save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. But Mayor Melanie Pilon says costs have been rising sharply in recent years, with an initial 68 per cent increase for 2025 softened by one-time funding from the provincial government. "Policing is very expensive, but it's something that every community needs to have and that's why it's a much larger conversation that we need to have, about how the province can take on the lion's share of these costs," said Pilon. The West Nipissing police service was disbanded in 2019 when the municipality hired the OPP. Mayor Kathleen Thorne Rochon says so far it's been cheaper for taxpayers and the savings allowed them to build a new police station. "You know, when you're running an independent organization with just 20 officers, everything's a lot more expensive. We do find that so far the transition has been great for us." Thorne Rochon says she is worried about the "significant" increase in the policing bill this past year. West Nipissing was one of several towns that got a grant from the province to cover the difference, but she says she does "worry" about how much protecting the community will cost in 2026. Josh Teresinski, the president of the Sault Ste. Marie Police Association, says he's not concerned about city council's plans to explore what it would cost to switch to the OPP. "I'm pretty confident," he said. "I don't want to say 100 per cent but, when you look at just the numbers right off the bat with the collective agreement and the benefits, your starting point with officers and civilian staff goes up right at the beginning." The association represents 68 civilian employees and 168 police officers. Teresinski says if the city were to disband the Sault Ste. Marie Police Service and sign an agreement with the OPP, it would be the civilian members who would be at the greatest risk of losing their jobs. "Our local dispatch, they may transfer them over, but they'd have to move out of the Sault to North Bay, as I believe that is where their dispatch is," he said. Teresinski says he understands the councillors' motivation to find savings by potentially switching to another police service, but he says those costs should be similar once the accounting is done. "I'm excited to see what their costing is and I'm pretty confident that it's going to be around the same cost as long as they're open and transparent about what the public is going to get," he said.
